Navigating the intricacies of faith can sometimes feel like trying to assemble IKEA furniture without the instructions—confusing and potentially leading to questionable results. Today, we dive into the thought-provoking distinction between a truth seeker and someone influenced to compromise their beliefs. Our discussion centers on how religious traditions can often obscure the true essence of faith, leading us to mistakenly equate earthly institutions with the divine intentions of Christ. As we unpack these ideas, I challenge you to reconsider the notion that Jesus established a visible church on earth, urging a fresh examination of what it truly means to belong to Him. We’ll explore the costs of loyalty, not just to our traditions but to the very truth that Christ embodies, and how embracing this can lead us to authentic spiritual growth. So, grab your coffee and let’s embark on this journey together, because truth, much like a well-brewed cup, is best when savored slowly. A deep dive into the often murky waters of religious tradition reveals a stark contrast between truth seekers and those who compromise their beliefs for the sake of tradition. The discussion begins by acknowledging an institutional assumption—that Jesus established a visible church on Earth—an idea that many hold without question. It prompts us to examine whether this assumption needs reevaluation. What if Christ did not die to create an organization, but to establish a community of believers united under His reign? This radical proposition challenges us to rethink our loyalties and the very essence of what it means to belong to Christ. Throughout the episode, we explore how traditions can often mask the true nature of faith, with an emphasis on the need for humility and a willingness to scrutinize our beliefs against the backdrop of Scripture. The call to action is clear: to love truth more than the comfort of inherited convictions, and to engage in a community that fosters honest dialogue about faith, rather than merely defending established norms. Ultimately, we are urged to realize that truth is not our possession; we are its servants, and our loyalty must always rest with Christ.

Takeaways:

• The podcast emphasizes the distinction between being a truth seeker and someone who merely adheres to tradition, highlighting the importance of examining our beliefs critically.
• Institutional assumptions can overshadow the true purpose of Christ's sacrifice, which was to create a community of believers rather than a rigid organization.
• Individual responsibility and accountability in faith are crucial, as worship and service should stem from a transformed life, not just attendance at institutional gatherings.
• Lessons from the Bereans illustrate the value of open-mindedness in faith, encouraging a culture of questioning and testing all beliefs against Scripture for authenticity.
• The conversation underscores the emotional costs of re-evaluating deeply held beliefs and how this process can feel like a betrayal to our communities and loved ones.
• Ultimately, the podcast invites listeners to consider their loyalty to Christ over tradition, emphasizing that truth must guide our faith rather than inherited conclusions.

Good day to you again and thank you so much for joining us in the study.

We want to continue where we left off last Sunday as we talked about the truth seeker and the individual that is influenced to compromise truth and the difference between the two.

To begin with though, I want to talk with you to begin the discussion about an institutional assumption.

And this is, I think, illustrating the problem, the attitudes that people have toward truth.

For many years I have struggled against religious tradition.

I have come to believe that religious tradition is among the most deceptive traditions of all.

Its power lies in the fact that it presents human structures as though they were the visible form of something that Christ himself ordained.

Across Christianity, traditions differ in so many ways.

Each possess features that give it legitimacy in its own society.

People have invited been invited to churches that they think most closely represents what Christ wants, or something of that kind.

What, what church best provides what they want.

In some cases, one might prefer music, another preaching, another program of some sort, another, some sacrament, another, the fellowship that they really like, another, maybe their Bible classes, another, some doctrinal distinctives.

But the religious landscape becomes a marketplace of visible institutions that compete with one another to represent Christ.

So you have a choice.

Behind these differences lies a widely shared assumption, though that is that Jesus established the church as a visible religious institution on earth.

And our task is to locate it which one, preserve, restore, reproduce that organization that he approves.

Now, once that premise is accepted, every tradition begins constructing the visible image they believe Christ intended.

Each and every system, each and every denominational system can point to its history, its structure, its practices, and all the identifying marts as evidence that it is the right church.

But what if the shared premise itself needs re examination?

What if Christ did not die to establish an earthly religious corporation or denomination or institution?

What if he purchased a people for his own possession?

A people called out of the dominion of darkness and brought under his reign?

What if the body of Christ is not an organization at all that possesses people in membership, but rather just simply a people who belong only to Christ?

The New Testament certainly describes believers who are gathering, teaching, they're serving, they're sharing with one another, they're correcting each other, they're caring for one another.

We certainly should not erase those visible signs of individual responsibilities.

But local order and shared life do not require us to turn the collective people of God into an institution with some independent identity and authority that competes with the headship of Jesus Christ.

Christ did not shed his blood for a certain brand.

He didn't shed his blood for building by, I think is obvious.

These people that get up and think, welcoming committee that thank one people for attending, visiting and getting into or coming to the house of God.

Just really, it's like scratching their nails on a chalkboard.

Where in the world do we get the right to compare God's house, which is simply his family, a relationship that belonged to him, his people, with a church building and call it the House of God?

I just, I don't understand.

But yet that's, that's the push that, that's the thing that we're trying to attract.

Our churches are trying to attract people that they're coming to this place.

And it's the house of God.

Christ never associated it with his, that building.

Peter described God's people as a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a royal or holy nation, a peculiar people.

Their identity rests not in a membership within some earthly institution or denomination, but in simply belonging to the one who called them out of darkness and into his marvelous light.

Now, Paul's language in Ephesians 4 points us toward Christ's purpose.

The goal is the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God.

Maturity, attainment to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

But this is not some future accomplishment as it is oftentimes presented.

It is a fulfilled work of Christ giving the gifted men to his people.

During this transition stage from a Jewish age to the new kingdom.

Now it is a people who is growing up into Christ, their head, and becoming transformed by the renewing of their minds, renewed Romans 12.

It is the unity produced when people surrender their competing wills and their identities and their loyalties to the one Lord.

They are united in faith because they are united in Him.

They grow with the knowledge of the Son of God because Christ, not the institution Christ, is the center and measure of their life.

Their service is also the response of a surrendered life.

Paul appealed to believers by the mercies of God to present their bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God.

Grace does not create a passive people who merely attend the activities of an institution.

But grace teaches them to deny ungodliness and worldly lust, to live soberly and righteously and godly and become zealous for good works.

The focus of New Testament Scripture is on individual responsibility and accountability.

Worship and service flow from a people transformed by mercy and yielded to Christ.

But when the institutional assumption goes unexamined, loyalty begins to quietly shift.

I have witnessed it over 30 years of pulpit preaching.

Protecting the organization becomes protecting the church.

Protecting the church becomes protecting Christ.

Because you can't separate the body from the head.

Questioning the organization is then treated as questioning Christ himself.

While the same confusion that prevented many in Israel from distinguishing God's revelation from their own inherited system is all it's produced, reproduced all over again today.

And it explains why institutional traditions can survive serious contradictions.

You know, a person is rarely asked merely to reconsider a passage.

He senses that he's being asked to leave a community, to disappoint his family, to be disloyal to his parents, to surrender his identity.

In essence, it means to admit that the visible structure that he defended may not be what Christ purchased at all.

And so that emotional cost becomes so high that the evidence is refused before it can ever be heard.

They never give it a chance.

This is not an invitation to isolation.

I'm not preaching or teaching spiritual independence here or contempt for fellow believers.

I'm really doing the very opposite.

What I'm calling for requires greater sacrifice, daily fellowship, involving people in your homes as a place of security and peace, a place where brethren gather to discuss matters of spiritual nature, to be an example to their children.

It is a unity, connectedness in the body, and Christ calls for that.

He calls his people into love and fellowship and mutual submission to encourage one another, yes, even to correct.

It's a place for service.

The question is whether those relationship they arise from shared submission to Christ or are made dependent upon loyalty to some human system.

You see, my friends, if the foundation is wrong, greater zeal is not going to correct the structure built upon it.

More attractive worship and stronger programs and better leadership and larger buildings and more precise branding can't turn a human institution into the people that Christ purchased.

The question has to be taken back to its foundation.

What did Christ establish?

What did he purchase with his blood?

And what does it mean to belong to Him?

That's precisely where love of truth is tested.

It's easy to examine another person's tradition, isn't it?

It's a lot harder to examine the precise, shared, the teaching that we've shared among ourselves.

If we love Christ more than the visible system built in his name, then we must be willing to let his word judge even the religious structures that have given us our own identity.

Truth has nothing to be ashamed of, has nothing to lose.

It's just whether you love it enough to be willing to count, to take the cost.

The other man that I want to talk about, that we introduced last time, is the second man in our study.

And that is simply the man that is the servant of truth.

He loves the truth.

He approaches truth very differently.

He's not necessarily less confident, less committed, or less knowledgeable.

He may hold his conviction strongly, just as strongly, but he understands that believing something with all of his heart does not guarantee that he has it, doesn't guarantee that he understands it.

Right.

His confidence in what he presently believes is accompanied by humility.

Humility enough to examine it and to re examine it.

He's open to investigation because he loves truth.

He loves it more than he loves the comfort of certainty, this truth.

That doesn't mean, friends, that he accepts every new interpretation.

Please understand that open mindedness is not gullibility.

He does not abandon the conviction merely because someone raises an objection.

Nor does he chase every novel doctrine that attracts attention.

Instead, he.

He subjects himself to the same test.

Every idea, whether it's old or new, familiar or unfamiliar, is given the same test, is brought through the same filter.

And that's the truth.

That's the word of God.

He passes every claim through the same sieve of investigation.

He asks, does it agree with Scripture?

Does it respect the context?

Does it account for all relevant passages on the subject?

Or does it depend upon ignoring some of them?

Does it fit the character and the purpose of God revealed in Christ?

Am I seeing what the text says, or only what I have been trained to see?

Have I defined important words by Scripture?

Or have I loaded them with assumptions inherited from later traditions?

When an idea appears to possess merit and scriptural support, this man doesn't just accept it immediately, he carries it with him.

He turns it over in his mind.

He prays about it.

He lays awake at night thinking about it.

He lays it out before the Lord and studies the passage again and restudies it.

He then may share it with some trusted friend, not merely those who will agree, but those capable of testing it honestly with him.

He allows time for the conclusion to be challenged, maybe to be refined a bit or corrected, or whether it's to be confirmed.

But he's willing to chew on it because he's not interested in winning some argument or keeping a reputation that others will approve, or collecting new ideas just for the sake of new ideas.

He wants to know whether it's truth or not.

And his willingness to investigate opens him to a lot of criticism.

That first man that we talked about, he's going to criticize this one.

The first man may interpret careful investigation as uncertainty.

He may question the very idea of questioning something as being doubtful, as being shaky, because he believes truth has already been completely identified and safely contained within his own system.

And he sees no legitimate reason to reopen it.

And from his perspective, truth should never be questioned because as he understands it, he already has it.

And so he may therefore regard the investigation and this second man as being very unstable, tossed to and fro.

And he'll quote those scriptures, always reconsidering matters and unable to be trusted with would be his analogy of this second man.

But there's an important difference I hope you could see between being carried about with every wind of doctrine and being willing to test one's convictions by the word of God.

The unstable man, he changes because he has no foundation.

But the truth seeking man is willing to change because truth is his foundation.

He doesn't change merely because another person speaks confidently.

He he changes when sufficient evidence convinces him that his former understanding cannot be sustained.

Now that's not weakness, friends.

It requires far more courage to correct a cherished belief than to defend one that has never been honestly examined.

You know, refusing to move is not always steadfastness.

Sometimes it's just fear standing still.

Biblical steadfastness means remaining faithful to God.

And faithfulness to God may require us to move away from an error that we once defended.

You know, I have a good example.

I think you'll appreciate the fact that the Bereans provided a very healthy model.

They received Paul's message with readiness.

It says, searching the scriptures daily to determine whether those things were so.

They possessed both receptiveness, they had some discernment.

But they didn't reject Paul because his teaching was unfamiliar.

Nor did they accept him merely because he claimed apostolic authority.

They listened and they investigated.

And Paul would have them know as he talked to the Thessalonians, prove all things, hold fast that which is good.

That doesn't mean reject everything except what you already believe.

Neither does it mean accept everything because it's possible.

It means every claim must be tested and only when whatever survives the examination should be then retained.

We can't honestly hold fast what's good until we are willing to prove all things.

Truth has nothing to fear from honest examination.

One of the greatest enemies is the prejudiced, closed minded person that has fastened a lock around the rim of their brain to prevent anything different from entering in.

And a closed mind can feel very much like a settled faith.

You know you can.

Both of them can speak with great confidence.

Both may refuse to move.

Both may call themselves loyal.

But a settled faith rests upon conclusions that have survived examination.

They've survived study, but a closed mind refuses to permit any kind of examination.

I once invited a brother of mine to study with me.

He told me he wasn't interested because he was going to.

He wasn't going to change, and he assumed that I wasn't going to change either.

And the statement really reveals a common misunderstanding of Bible study.

If neither of us is willing to change, we're not coming together to search for truth.

We're merely coming together to defend positions that we've already declared as being true.

What if neither of us entered intending to change the other person?

What if both of us could enter into a willing discussion with the possibility of being changed by the truth?

Wouldn't that be great?

What if we placed our conclusions upon the table, opened the Scriptures and gave God the final word?

Wouldn't that be wonderful?

The proper attitude you see here is not I'm going to change you.

Neither is it.

You'll never change me.

It's simply, if I'm wrong, I want truth to change me.

And if you're wrong, put I want truth to change you.

And if we're both mistaken, then let's love God and truth enough to change together.

That second man understands that truth is not his possession.

He's just its servant.

He doesn't stand above it as its owner, defender, or its judge.

He simply stands beneath it, permitting it to examine him, permitting it to correct him and to reshape his understanding.

His loyalty is not demonstrated by refusing ever to change.

His loyalty is demonstrated by refusing to allow pride and family, tradition and religious heritage, personal reputation or fear of criticism to prevent him from changing when truth requires it.

Following Christ requires more than defending conclusions about him.

It requires allowing the truth to examine us, to conform us, to correct us.

The disciple does not expect Christ to fit comfortably within everything that he already believes.

He expects his understanding and his affections, his conduct, all of that, to be brought into submission to Christ.

And that process can be painful.

And I'll tell you why.

Beliefs are seldom isolated things.

They're connected to people.

Family, friendships and congregations.

Memory, reputation, a sense of belonging.

Changing a religious conclusion may feel like separating ourselves from the people who shaped us.

It may bring criticism from friends and disappointment from relatives, rejection from a religious community.

It may require us to admit that something we confidently taught others that we were now mistaken about.

But growth requires change, doesn't it?

A seed that never opens, never becomes a tree.

A child who never changes, never reaches maturity.

And a disciple of Christ who refuses correction cannot grow into the image of Jesus.

Spiritual growth, friends, does not mean abandoning truth for every new idea.

It just simply means surrendering every part of ourselves that does not conform to him, to his truth.

The second man's loyalty is therefore not measured by how closely he preserves every conclusion of his tradition.

And it's not measured by how faithfully he repeats everything taught by his parents and his grandparents.

He can honor those people without treating them as infallible.

Genuine respect for those who taught us does not require us to perpetuate their mistakes.

We may appreciate their sincerity, we may remember their sacrifices, and we may imitate their virtues and thank God for the good they placed within us, while at the same time acknowledging that they may have been mistaken in some.

Some way.

Now, those whom we loved and who have passed on from this life would surely not want us to follow them into the error they had in life just to prove our loyalty to them.

If they now know that something they taught was wrong, they wouldn't want us to continue teaching it in their memory.

They would want us to leave their era and follow Christ.

They would say, don't be loyal to our mistake.

Be loyal to the Lord.

The account of the rich man in Lazarus in Luke 16 comes to mind.

I think it gives a lot of force to this thought.

Because whatever conclusion we draw about in this, you know, the present knowledge of those who have died, Jesus really illustrates in the Rich man in the fact that he was painfully aware of his condition and deeply concerned for five brothers that were still living back on earth.

He didn't want them to preserve his legacy.

He didn't want them to remain loyal to his example.

He pleaded for some warning to be sent to them that they would repent and not come to the same place.

Now, if those who have gone on before us are conscious of religious errors that they once believed or taught, they wouldn't ask us to preserve those same errors out of respect for them.

They would urge us to hear Moses and the prophets, or in this case, to listen to Jesus and his apostles examine the scriptures, change while opportunity remains.

Love doesn't ask another person to follow us into ruin.

It points us away from our error and toward the Lord.

We must never allow love for our influencers to substitute for loyalty to Jesus.

We don't honor parents by repeating their mistakes, friends.

We don't honor our teachers by refusing to listen to further instruction or honor our religious heritage and our tradition by closing our hearts to greater understanding.

If every generation just inherits the conclusions of the previous generation and then locks its mind against any other further thought, any other examination, I'll guarantee you error becomes almost impossible to correct because you don't love the truth enough to correct it.

Tradition is repeated.

In this case, it'll just keep on being defended.

It'll keep being handed down from one generation and to another until one day the age, the oldness of that tradition is mistaken for evidence for truth.

I've seen that you have too.

Our parents did not die for us.

Our preachers did not purchase us with their blood.

Our religious traditions are not seated at the right hand of God.

You can honor every faithful influencer in your life, but our final loyalty belongs to Jesus Christ.

Christ.

The choice before us, then, is not between conviction and uncertainty.

It's really between two kinds of conviction.

One rests in the security of an inherited conclusion handed down from our fathers and refuses any examination beyond what we've already accepted.

The other rests in Christ and therefore has the courage to examine everything in light of his revelation.

The first man says, I can't consider anything you give me because it contradicts the truth that I already possess.

The second man says, I'll test it because truth has nothing to fear.

The first man protects his system from the evidence.

The second man asks the evidence to expose every weakness of his system.

The first man treats change as a betrayal.

But the second man understands that refusing to change when Christ corrects him would be the greater betrayal.

None of us begins without a bias.

We all have them.

None of us read Scripture without some inherited language, some assumption that we've accepted, some memory.

And humility does not require pretending that we have no convictions.

It just requires acknowledging.

But our convictions remain accountable to the Lord.

We're not asked to live without conclusions.

We're asked never to make our conclusions untouchable, as if we can't ever revisit them.

We must also resist the temptation to turn love for truth into pride over being different.

A man can reject one tradition only to make his rejection a new tradition.

He can take pride in being unconventional or.

Or suspicious of someone and accountable to no one.

That's not the spirit of Christ, the truth seeker.

He remains teachable, patient, gentle, but always willing to listen.

He does not measure faithfulness by how many people he can denounce or prove wrong, but by how completely he can surrender to the Lord.

And so love for truth governs how we treat those that we disagree with.

Even if we remember how deeply identity and tradition are intertwined, then we will speak plainly, not by.

Not with contempt, not with arrogance.

We'll just.

We're not going to confuse practice with compromise or kindness with being relative.

You know, thinking truth is relative.

Truth remains absolute.

And people who often come to see it, see it gradually.

We should give people that opportunity, give others the same honest opportunity to examine that we hope they'll give us.

The purpose of our investigation is not just endless investigation.

It's not like the Athenians who are looking for something new to ponder or some philosopher.

Once a conclusion has survived careful examination, we should hold it, accept it with courage, and live by it.

Yet even then, our confidence should remain joined to that humility.

We don't say I can never be wrong.

We say, this is where the evidence has brought me and I will stand here because clearer truth from God requires my correction.

Paul's warning remains before us.

And those who don't receive the love of the truth open themselves to delusion and the believing of a lie.

The danger is not confined to unbelievers outside of religious life.

It reaches every heart that would rather preserve their identity than be corrected by the Lord.

And so let's be asking ourselves, what belief am I unwilling even to examine?

What conclusion must remain true because too much of my life has been built upon it?

What approval am I afraid to lose?

What religious structure have I confused with people Christ purchased with his own blood?

Let me ask the greater question.

What is Christ worth to you?

Is he worth the loss of an argument?

Worth the embarrassment of admitting that you were wrong?

Is he worth disappointing a religious circle of people?

Is he worth leaving behind a familiar identity?

Is truth worth the cost of following wherever he leads?

Jesus Christ is not asking us to be loyal to every conclusion that we've ever reached.

He's asking us to be loyal to Him.

He's not honored when we defend error in his name.

He's honored when we love him enough to be corrected by it.

And may we never become so certain that we possess the truth that we lose our love for it.

May we never defend a tradition so fiercely that Christ becomes a stumbling stone to us.

And may we never preserve the mistakes of those we loved at the expense of the Lord who purchased us.

Let's receive the love for the truth.

Let's prove all things and hold fast to that which is good.

Let's search the Scriptures with readiness of mind, allowing the word of God to expose and correct and mature us until we become to the unity of the faith and knowledge of the Son of God, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.

Truth is not our possession, friends.

We are its servants.

The people of God do not belong to our systems.

They belong to Jesus.

And because Christ is Lord, our final loyalty must belong to him.

I trust that you will give this some serious thought.

I pray you have a very good day today, a pleasant week.

And trust that you will join me again at 7:30 next Sunday.

Thanks again.